Jooster multi-chapter series: The Long Road, Chapter 7

[triedunture]

Title: The Long Road (Chapter 7)
[Previous parts: Chapter One, Chapter Two, Chapter Three, Chapter Four, Chapter Five, Chapter Six]
Rating: PG13? I feel very silly giving this a rating. Just make up your own minds!
Beta: the ever-so British hwshipper
Length: 3000
Warnings: Angst, violence, general dark themes.
Summary: A very bad thing happens. And then we must go on.

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Once the door closed on Jeeves' sister, the flat was quiet again. The only sound Bertie could hear was the faintest hum of conversation coming from the master bedroom. Though it wasn't the done thing to listen at keyholes, curiosity got the better of him, and Bertie crept to the bedroom door to hear the conversation between the long-separated father and son.

It was actually rather dull. A lot of 'How are you feelings?' and 'Much improved, thank yous'. Bertie had the distinct urge to throw the door open and yell, 'Say what you bally well mean, the both of you!'

But the next statement, spoken in the elder Jeeves' north-country drawl, gave Bertie pause. 'This Mr Wooster seems a fair sort. Do you think you'll be inclined to stick with this one, then?'

Bertie could hear Jeeves' sigh clean through the door. 'Please, Father, let's not have this discussion again.'

'It's no discussion, Reg. I merely mention on account of, last I heard, you were leaving your tenth, or was it eleventh, master?'

'That was a long time ago,' Jeeves answered.

'Yes, but you were always a restless child, Reggie. Always wanting to go beyond the farthest hill, always wondering what was in the deepest part of the ocean.'

'Mr Wooster allows me an indulgent amount of time to travel, should I wish to do so.'

'That's not the point. The point is, I don't see why you won't—'

'If I have said this once, I have said it a thousand times: I cannot return to Wingfield and take up the post of an underbutler,' Jeeves' voice was doubly weary. Not only was his bodily exhaustion straining his words, but also the added weight of what sounded like an oft-repeated argument.

'Is Wingfield Hall so beneath you now?' Mr Jeeves said. 'Do you laugh about it with the boys at the club?'

'Of course not,' Jeeves said. 'I only wish to stay in Mr Wooster's employ. Father, I'm good at being a valet.'

'Yes, a valet. Sailing to America at the drop of a hat, walking the streets of London at all hours. That's what got you here, you know.' Bertie could hear the rage leaking into the pater's voice. 'Your grandfather was a butler, and his father was a butler. If only you would settle down where you belong, away from all the madness of this city. I only want you to be—'

'Father.' Jeeves was silent for a long moment, and Bertie peeked into the crack of the door to see what was happening. Jeeves had taken hold of his father's wrist with one hand and had pressed a finger to own his lips in a gesture for quiet. In an instant, Jeeves' sharp eyes darted to the doorway and caught Bertie standing there.

Bertie flushed. The silence was for his benefit, he knew. Any topic of conversation that would upset the young master was apparently Off Limits. Bertie made to leave the doorway to escape, ashamed at being caught spying, but then Mr Jeeves followed his son's line of sight to find Bertie as well.

'Mr Wooster,' he said as if he had been jolted by a thunderbolt.

Bertie shuffled into the room a pace, feeling the need to explain the intrusion. 'Apologies, my good men. Just wanted to make certain...' And Bertie trailed off, not knowing how to say 'just wanted to make certain you hadn't killed each other.' Instead he toed his foot into the carpeting and said, 'You were so tearful earlier in the kitchen, Mr Jeeves. I only wanted to see that you were feeling better.'

Jeeves' eyebrows quirked in a way that showed his incredulity. 'My father has never shed a tear in his life, sir. Surely you're mistaken.'

But his father turned a shamed red, nearly matching his hair. 'Oh, Reggie,' he sighed, 'that's absolute tosh. Why, when your mother died, I must have let loose enough moisture to drown everyone in King's Lynn.'

Bertie kept to the edges of the room to better watch the action playing out. It may have been his vivid imagination, but he could swear he saw Jeeves' admonishing hand tighten on the elder man's arm. 'No, that is not possible.' His voice was grave and firm. 'You were the very picture of composed dignity during that time.'

Mr Jeeves gave a harsh chuckle. 'Well, you would have been too. Three children to look after, two of them still living at the Hall, a master who had fallen on hard times. A widower butler is no prize, Reg.' He squeezed his shaking hands round his son's grasping fingers. 'I couldn't go to pieces in front of Mr Wingfield and the rest of the staff. One misstep and I would have been sacked.'

'But I had thought you were made of stone,' Jeeves whispered to his father. 'I had thought you...'

'Thought I didn't care about your mother's passing? Oh, Lord,' he answered. 'I was bawling my eyes out every night after I put you to bed. Cath heard me once. I tried to tell her I'd pinched my finger in the door. As if she'd believe me; always been a sharp girl.'

Bertie had to strain his ears to hear Jeeves' next words: 'Oh, Father.'

A tear, silvery in the waning cloudy-day light from the window, slid down the old man's cheek. 'I'll cry in front of your sister, Reg. And I'll even shed a tear in front of Mr Wooster here, a complete stranger to me, to be sure. But I can't stand letting you see me like this. You're so like your mother. And she could never abide seeing a man cry.' He took a handkerchief from his waistcoat pocket and blew his nose in that loud locomotive way that only fathers can manage.

Jeeves leaned forward carefully, one hand pressed to his injured side, and wrapped his free arm round his father's shoulder. The two Jeeves men sat there, one whimpering quietly ('I loved her so, so much. I did...'), the other murmuring soothing words ('It's all right. I know. It's all right now.') while Bertie watched in fascination. Then, perceiving that no chairs were going to be flung at anybody's head that night, he crept out of the room.

Because he wasn't sure if Mr Jeeves would have need of the bed in the servant's quarters or if he intended to sit up all night with his son, Bertie chose to curl up on the chesterfield. He closed his eyes and listened to the low, unintelligible murmur of Jeevesian voices from down the hall and, soothed by this, he managed to fall into a light sleep.

He knew instantly that this had been a poor idea.

His dreams were once again plagued by vague shapes, nameless fears, and dark shadows. At one moment, Bertie was running down a narrow alley, pursued by the man with the gun, who had grown to nightmarish proportions with lizard-like limbs and a snapping tail. The next moment, Bertie was in the house of his boyhood, the lacy curtains of the old playroom's window swaying in the breeze.

'Why are you so out of breath, Bertie?' his sister, as small as she had been age nine, asked. Her building blocks were spread out before her in disarray: broken city towers. 'What have you been running from?'

'The billfold,' the curtains whispered. 'Give it here.'

'Bertie? Is that you?' his father called from down the hall, an invisible, disembodied voice. Bertie turned towards it, his mouth hanging open.

'Father's been looking for you forever,' his sister whispered. 'He's found you now, though, hasn't he?'

The roof cracked open, and the sky cracked open, and it thundered and rained down into the house of Bertram Wooster's childhood. His sister and her blocks melted away along with the walls. Back in the alley, kneeling in a puddle. Everything wet. Jeeves on the ground before him, face turned away on the cobblestones. Not rain but blood. Coming down in buckets.

'No!' Bertie cried, his eyes flying open. His arm flailed out before him, nearly striking a perturbed-looking Mrs Fennaweave in the face.

'Control yourself, Mr Wooster,' she barked. 'I was only checking to see if you were breathing. You were sleeping like a dead man. Scared the wits out of me.'

'Mrs Fennaweave,' Bertie panted. 'I'm sorry. I was having the most awful dream.'

'Mmm. Yes.' Mrs Fennaweave looked unimpressed with this explanation. 'Dr Hollis should be stopping by today to check up on the patient. You might want to change into a clean suit, Mr Wooster.' She gave a pointed look to the suit that Bertie was still wearing after having slept in it for two nights straight.

'Quite. And a quick bath probably wouldn't go amiss, what?' Bertie gave her a sheepish half-smile. He rolled himself from the chesterfield and brought a hand up to scrub at his sleep-filled eyes. A strip of fabric hung on his wrist, caught in his right cuff-link: the yellow tie. Bertie stared at it, hanging there like an exotic, poisonous snake.

'Mr Wooster?' Mrs Fennaweave snapped, and Bertie realised she must have been trying to get his attention for some time.

'Er, yes?'

'I was attempting to tell you that, if you wish to bathe in the master bathroom, you will have to wait a few minutes. I'll be giving the patient a sponge bath in your rooms,' she said.

Bertie, who had been busy trying to untangle the yellow tie from his arm, paused to stare at her, his mouth agape. 'Give him a what?'

'A sponge bath.' Mrs Fennaweave nodded to the burden in her arms: a small basin filled with water and a soft sponge, its yellow body already turning a dark brown as it soaked.

'Oh, really now. Is that strictly necessary?' Bertie perched his fists on his hips, forgetting the tie that dangled like a banner from his right wrist.

'I have one word for you, Mr Wooster: in-fect-ion,' the nurse said. 'The patient must be kept clean and comfortable.'

'Well, you can't possibly give Jeeves a sponge bath,' Bertie sputtered. 'His, his modesty would forbid it!'

'I am a professional,' the woman said with cold precision. 'I have seen plenty of bare male bodies in my time. Believe me when I tell you there is nothing to be coy about.'

'Look, it's just—' Bertie pursed his lips. 'Can't you let me do it?'

Mrs Fennaweave rolled her eyes in a most exaggerated manner. 'Why in the world would you not allow me, the person to whom you've entrusted your valet's care, to do my job?'

All Bertie knew was that, if their positions were reversed and it was himself laid up in bed, Bertie would expect Jeeves to keep people like Mrs Fennaweave from scrubbing the Wooster corpus a fresh and rosy hue. The humiliation involved would be intolerable.

Instead of revealing all this to the dour nurse, Bertie said with some modicum of tact, 'I only want to help. I imagine you have plenty of other tasks to see to before the doctor arrives, what?'

Mrs Fennaweave frowned. 'Well, I would like to make myself an egg or two. I haven't eaten for—'

'Right! Well.' Bertie yanked the washbasin from her wrinkled hands. 'You leave this to Bertram, then.'

The nurse frowned, but relented with a hesitant nod. 'Remember to be gentle round the wound,' she ordered.

'Certainly.'

'And clean behind his ears.'

'Wouldn't dream of giving that a miss.'

'And come get me if you see any redness or puffiness near the new stitches.'

'Yes, of course.'

'And don't go into the valet's quarters! I put the old butler in there to get some blasted sleep. He was up half the night, twittering away with the patient. I had to chase him off so everyone could get some shut-eye.'

'Jeeves Senior in Jeeves Junior's room. Got it.'

With a final glare, the black-clad nurse bustled into the kitchen. Bertie took this opportunity to free his hand from the yellow tie and find a cigarette lighter in the case on the drinks cabinet. The lighter's wheel clicked once, twice before the wick ignited, and the yellow tie caught after only a moment of dangling it over the orange flame. Bertie watched the fire creep up the sunny fabric, then, satisfied it was burning steadily, he threw it in the fireplace grate. He did not look back.

Bertie clutched the basin of warm water to his chest and made his way to the master bedroom, careful not to slosh. He found Jeeves sitting up in bed, a drawn look across his face.

'Good morning, sir,' he said. Then, seeing Bertie's wrinkled shirt, 'I must be overly tired and imagining things, for it appears your clothes have been slept in.'

'Stretched out on the sofa last night, I'm afraid,' Bertie said apologetically. 'We have a full house here, Jeeves. Fennaweave in the guest room, your father in your room...'

'My father did not retire until the early morning hours, sir.' Jeeves said this only half-admonishing. 'You need a good night's rest; if I may be so bold, you are not looking your freshest, sir.'

Bertie set the washbasin on the bedside table with a shrug. 'Can't seem to close the peepers much these days, Jeeves. Now, let's see what we've got here.' He lifted the damp sponge from the basin and squeezed it experimentally, letting the excess water fall back into the pan.

Jeeves seemed to grasp what the instruments of cleanliness were for. 'Sir, if I may—' he began.

'Jeeves, you have two options. I invite you to choose for yourself. Either I will be washing you down this morning, or the aged Mrs Fennaweave will.' Bertie turned and brandished his sponge. 'It won't bruise my pride if you'd rather not have me as your scrubber, but I would hazard a guess that no man, even you, would relish the thought of the Nurse of the Baskervilles soaping you up.'

'I'd rather wash myself, sir,' Jeeves protested.

Bertie shook his head gravely. 'Not one of the choices, I'm afraid. I have no doubt Mrs Fennaweave would eat me alive if she found out I'd let you carry out this office yourself. You're still healing, Jeeves. You can't be twisting and bending all over the place.'

Still Jeeves hesitated. 'Could this not wait another day, sir?'

'You've already been lying in bed for two days, Jeeves. I'm afraid now's the time for it.'

'Has it really been that long?' he asked, absently bringing a hand up to feel the dark prick of stubble on his chiseled jaw. Faced with this evidence, Jeeves weakly pushed the bedclothes down to his waist. His bare chest, still swathed in bandages, rose and fell with each laboured breath; Bertie watched it carefully.

'Yes, I know. It feels like it was only an hour ago that I put on that...' Bertie remembered the yellow tie, now smouldering in the fireplace if there was any luck in the world. 'Well, let's not think of it, what?'

After a moment of gentle negotiation, it was decided that the best way to go about this bathing business was to manoeuvre Jeeves to sit on the edge of the mattress with a towel scooted underneath his bottom. Jeeves draped his legs over the side of the bed slowly, holding his injured side with one hand and pinching his eyes shut as he moved.

'All right?' Bertie asked, lending a hand on his shoulder.

Jeeves nodded tightly. 'After so many hours of repose, the muscles of the human body undoubtedly constrict, sir. I am certain small movements will—' He stopped with a sudden gasp, clutching at his flank. 'Oh, god,' he cursed under his breath. Bertie froze in shock; he had never heard Jeeves take the Lord's n. in v. before.

'Jeeves? What should I do?' Bertie fluttered round the seated man, wondering if he should place his hands to the afflicted area, or perhaps Jeeves' shoulders again, or perhaps nowhere at all.

'Nothing, sir. I apologise. Mrs Fennaweave informed me that the cracked rib would be painful for many more days, but this...' He took a deep, shuddering breath, his eyes still closed against the pain. 'This is worse than I imagined, sir,' he finally admitted.

'Where does it hurt?' Bertie asked, thinking, like a child might, that he could solve the problem if only he knew where it was hiding.

'In all places,' Jeeves said through gritted teeth. 'Every breath is like a fire racing along each nerve.' It was a testament to how much of Jeeves control was slipping: he had answered Bertie's question without even the barest veil of optimism thrown over it.

'Jeeves.' Bertie eyed the valet seriously. 'You must allow the good nurse to give you more medicine. I know you hate how it makes you feel; dash it, I'm not too wild about what it does to you either. But if it takes away some of this awful pain, then you need it.'

'No,' Jeeves growled, looking up with eyes red with the fever of determination. 'My body has failed me. I won't allow my mind to follow the same path.'

'So you'd rather sit here in agony than act a tad cuckoo for an hour or so?'

'Yes, sir, I would.' Jeeves' tone brokered no argument.

Bertie fidgeted with the sponge under the intense weight of Jeeves' eyes. 'Well, if you insist. It is your body and mind, after all. But I do wish you'd let Mrs Fennaweave give you the morphine. It would soothe me to know you weren't in such a bally awful way.'

Jeeves sighed and moved gingerly to sit on the very edge of the mattress. 'If the pain gets any worse, sir, I promise to acquiesce to your wishes. For now, however, I can manage.'

'You drive a hard bargain, Jeeves. But no matter; it's bath time, what?' And Bertie waggled his sponge in the air in a way that meant, 'You've got what's coming to you.'



Continue to Chapter 8.